races , sus era a, come a 1ve 1n .......'er

tw e nty years , in the Perth waters, was a wonderfully nostalgic exper ience."

BY NISHA JOSEPH

undreds of spectators on the lake front erupted with joy as the boats sliced through the waters, the oarstnen throwing their oars in unison to the fast -paced rhythm of the KeraJan dru1ns.

K era la 1s famous snake boat races?

No , Perth's newest cultural experience.

Th e snake -boat (chundan) races in Ker ala, a centuries-old tradition of water regatta called Vallam Kali, were suspended this year du e to COV I D.

How eve r, for the first time ever in Australia, the spirit of Vallam Kali was celebrated with great fervour right here, in the scen ic waters of Perth. Cha1npion L akes becan1e Vembanad Kaay a l and dragon boats b eca n1e our beloved chun.dans for a day.

1-leld in late Septe1nber with necessary safety and hygiene precautions in place, the event was organised by the Perth United Malayalee Association In c with Champion Lake s Boating Club.

They called it Jalvolsavam (Water Festival).

Thirt ee n teams competed in fo ur qualifying races. Eight teams progressed to the se mi-final s, and four fought the finals.

The boat Piara Chundan of the Piara Spartans team claimed the first Jalol sava ,n Vallamkali Trophy. Karichal Chundan and Maylands Chundan finished second and third respectively.

"It took a lot of effort and weeks of practice to get to this stage," a thrilled Binish Varghese, captain of Piara Spartans

H is boat this tim e , I(aricha l Chundan is in fact named in honour of a glorious black snake boat in Kerala with the same name. Water regatta has been a part of Kerala's cultural heritage fo r centuries, the unusual boats themselves a great symbo l of the state. The vigour of the rowers is n1atched equally by the enthusiasm of the drummerhelmsmen, as well as by the cheering appreciation of th e crowds. The helmsmen's singing of the boat song (Vanchipattu) to urge on the rhythm of the rowers is just as iconic. Its Australian avatar cou ld well b eco me an annual affair.

PIARA

Spartans

f.,. ' told Indian Li nk.

Anish Varughese , the team's energetic drummer-cun1-coach con1es fro1n a 1nusic background, which served him well in encouraging his team to the finish line.

Most of their team members work in emergency services like H ealth services and Poli cing, with all of them nurturing a passion for native country sports like

Vadcunvalli (Tug of War) and football, and that made this event even more special.

Pa rticipant Thon1as Jo seph brought special experience - having actually contested at the iconic races in Kerala.

" I was a regular oarsman of the Jaw ahar Thayangari chundan in the Kuttanad boat race for several years," he told Indian Link. " R owing this year after a gap of

Raveesh Kar anil John , PUMA coordinator, observed, "We did not expec t such a good turnout of teams, a nd suc h support from the public. The event which was originally scheduled for March had to be postponed owing to COVID 19 and now, organising th is in September amidst the mild showers, added that monsoonic feel of an authentic Onam. "

[n his inaugural speech, Paul Papalia, (WA Minister fo r Tourism, Racing and Gaming , Small Bu siness, D efence Issues, Citizenship and Multicultural Interests) sa id , " It is wonderful to be witnessing the snake boat festival at Champion Lakes. I cong ratulate the participants and the organisers at PUMA."

H e was joined by dignitarie s Kevin Mi chel (M LA Pilbara), Yaz Mubarakai (M LA Jandakot), Ruth Butterfield (Mayor Armadale) and John Bl e inke (President, Cha1npion Lakes Boating Club).

The Jalolsavam experience gave them a slice of the best of Kerala , from its food to its ba ckwaters, right here in Perth for the first time.

Adelaide artist Peter Drew celebrates migrants and multiculturali sm in his poster campaign

BY JYOTI SHANKAR

hen waiting outside a popular street-food r estaurant in Harris Park for a takeaway recently, l noticed a striking poster on the blank wall of the carpark. It was a picture, now frayed at the edges, of a turbaned man with the word 'AUSS I E' b eneat h.

A quick l iiternet search to ld n1e that the poster was the cteation of P eter D rew, an artist fron1 Adelaide. And so, my quest be gan.

Th e turbaned, moustached 1nan in the poster was Pu njab -born Monga Kh an, who a rriv ed in Australia in 1895 and was a hawker in rural Victoria until his death in 1930. His im age came to Peter fron1 the National Archives of people who lived h e r e durin g the time of the White Australia Poli cy - 1901 to 1958.

" Did Australia inheri t its id entity from the p eople who created the White Australia policy, or do es 'Au ssie' have 01ore to do with people who survived it?" Peter said, explai nin g the inspiration behind the poster. It date s back to early 2016 when the refugee cdsis was at its peak. While Europe welcomed tho u sands of refugees arriving from wa r-torn Syria and A fghan i s tan , Australia was smug about its effective bord er control policies. With the ai1n of reforming the 1nea ning of 'A u ssie' with hi s poster campaign, Peter hit back.

Few posters fro1n his original street a rt campaign hav e survived, and the posters you see today are because P eter continues putting them, and new creat ion s, all over Australia during two trips eac h year.

It 's a hard haul, cooking glue f ro1n flour and screen-printing bundteds of posters in his studio, before he walks the streets to find suitable spots to put them up. The glue bucket, a mop and a fluo r escent jacket are his usual gear, as he travels by public transport and sticks his posters up until his blistered feet can stand no more.

"It is ironic that the high-vis clothing makes you invisible! l very rarely get stopped by anyone who knows who I am," he told I ndian Link.

" Many people have seen my posters, but most still don't know who I am. Who I am is not important, what matters is that the a udi ence sees Monga Khan and wonder who he is!"

Th e artist's unintentional anonymity has even meant that Peter's Indian neighbours did not realise he was the person behind the 'Aussie' posters until his work came up in a conversation one day.

" I t was very funny to see the look on the face when he co nn ected the dots and r ealised that it was me who was putting up the posters that he had been seeing for a wh ile now," chuckled Peter.

T he pandemic has affected the artist's travel plans this year, but he used the time off to ponder over adapting his street art to a gallery format.

I n his exhibition Flags 1, currently on at Adelaide's Peter Walker G allery, he uses the Australian flag blended with images of people from the Nationa l Archives to continue to explore the "implicit et hni c bias within the core of the nation state."

Th e response to his posters around the country ove r the years has been overwhelming ly positive, but Pete r does not seem himself as an act iv ist. He says that there are en dl ess problems in the world and he does not go looking for the next big problem to so lve.

" I t is n1ore about me trying to di scove r what my own id e ntity is by engag in g with the idea of Australia. I would like to think that my place is not to fix problems, but to open a door where people can t hink about their identity in a different way," he sa id

"What makes Au st ralia a great plac e to live is its multiculturism."

The next time I saw the 'Aussie' poster again, in another unexpected corner of the city, it brought a sm ile to my face. I thought about Monga Khan and the journeys of all the migrants before me - thanks to Peter Drew

: BAD BOY BILLIONAIRES

1

(Netflix)

STARRING : Siddharth Mallya , James

I Crabtree, Mick Brown, Shobhaa De

1 DIRECTOR: Dylan Mohan Gray,

1 Johanna Hamilton, Nick Read

I That Bad Boy Billionaires: India was I created should hardly come as a I surprise. If Latin America has an infamous history with narcotics (and I the successful Narcos on Netflix),

I then India has had quite the troubled

I past with financial scams. The real, pleasant surprise is that Bad Boy

I Billionaires, after a month of legal

I tussles with various Indian courts, was

1 finally allowed to stream at all.

For months, Netflix teased audiences, I promising to explore ''the greed, fraud, I and corruption" that surrounded

I some of India 's most famous tycoons - jeweller Nirav Modi, liquor baron

I Vijay Mallya, industrialist Subrata Roy , I and entrepreneur Ramalinga Raju.

I Full disc losure: Bad Boy Billionaires doesn't offer particularly new insights on these business magnates. But it works as a good refresher on the I scams - and the environment that

I allowed them to come to be.

I In the first episode, we revisit 'The King of Good Times ' Vijay Mallya and I the rise and fall of his kingdom. It' s

I a good, strategic move to start with him , the person who put the ' bad boy '

I in ' bad boy billionaire'. And with his

I reputation Mallya also brings along

I prominent interviewees l ike childhood

1 friend Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw (quite the surprise), journalist Vir Sanghvi,

I author Shobhaa De, and even his party

I boy son, Siddharth Mall ya.

1 Unfortunately, 'The King of Good Times' episode and Bad Boy

I Billionaires on a whole doesn ' t pack

I the necessary punches to truly grip

1 its audience. With a subject like this , there are two treatments that would be

I satisfying - a full -on throw down of the I tycoons and their awful, manipulative I scheming; or a strong, unwavering defence of their practices as part of a I profit maximising, capitalist mentality.

I In trying to toe the line of objectivity,

Bad Boy Billionaires simply becomes a re-hash of existing media reports (with I the addition of glamorous footage and I intriguing infographics).

On its own , each episode -' The I K ing of Good Times ', Nirav Modi ' s I " Diamonds aren ' t forever ', and I Subrata Roy ' s ' The world ' s biggest 1 family ' - can feel like 60-minute montages of the tycoons.

I When watched together though, I there's something to be said. Each 1 episode highlights the role of India 's public banks , and how the scams

I boil down to the contrivance of bank

I officials. Why weren 't Mallya ' s finances I I properly ascertained before the 1 damning Veritas report? How was Nirav I Modi able to bribe officials for six years I I before it came to light? As much as I

1 we can loathe the bad boy billionaires, it's hard to deny that they are part of a I larger, corrupt system in India.

I Interviewees like James Crabtree

I (the author of The Billionaire Raj: A Journey Through India ' s New Gilded I Age ) are welcomingly insightful in this I regard. As Mod i's diamond chapter comes to a close, Crabtree's voiceover reminds us of the double standard in the way corruption is viewed. After all, corruption in " developing" countries like India can only be possible with the help of international financial systems (think shell companies and tax havens) of "developed" countries.

To its credit, Bad Boy Billionaires also takes into account political and economic factors. When the 2008 recession struck, Kingfisher's 'good times' evolved from bad to worse. When Prime Minister Modi was elected to power in 2014, his anti -corruption stance meant that Nirav Modi had nowhere to hide. In this house of cards, if even one of these elements hadn ' t taken place, who 's to say how the tycoons might've fared?

For those outside India and unaware of these scandals, they're a shocking case study of what happens when the system fails. Would an Australian company ever get away with not paying its employees for over 6 months? Would Sahara's pyramid -scheme ever work in Canada's business environment? The odds are slim. Also, considering two of the three directors aren't of Indian heritage, it's likely the series is, indeed, meant for that global audience.

Despite all these criticisms, though, the series is worth at least one watch. It may not bring new facts to light, but Bad Boy Billionaires is available for streaming precisely because of that fact - it used information already in the public domain. The fourth episode on Satyam's Ramalinga Raju remains stuck in legal limbo, but fingers crossed it ' ll see the light of day too.

Rhea Nath